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The York community will have a chance to learn about different aspects of and approaches to Black history, with special regard to Canadian issues, at a day-long Black History Month Workshop to be held on Friday, Feb. 27, at Founders College Assembly Hall and Harriet Tubman Resource Centre on the African Diaspora, also in Founders College.
The workshop is being organized by the University’s Harriet Tubman Resource Centre on the African Diaspora, in honour of Black History Month and the United Nations’ designated International Year to Commemoriate the Struggle Against Slavery and Its Abolition.
Right: Cover of book by Bryan Prince
Morning sessions, to be held in the Assembly Hall, will include: a presentation by journalist Susan Poizner of episode one of the film, Mother Tongue: The Other Side of History, made by the independent production company ThinkStock Inc.; a screening and discussion of a CBC documentary on the Underground Railroad; a book launch for I Came as a Stranger: The Underground Railroad by Bryan Prince; and the launch of the new NorthStar interactive Web site, developed by the Tubman centre, Eugene Onutan (the Webmaster with the centre) and Carlos Liberato, a PhD student in York’s Department of History, who works under the supervision of York Professor Paul Lovejoy. Lovejoy, director of the Harriet Tubman Resource Centre, will make the opening remarks.
The afternoon will feature a workshop on Web site development, to take place at the Tubman centre. The workshop is free and open to all York students as well as the general public. Sponsors for this event include the Department of History and Founders College.
For a full program of events visit the Harriet Tubman Resource Centre on the African Diaspora.
Right: Carter G. Woodson
Black History Month was first launched in 1926 by Dr. Carter G. Woodson, a leading intellectual of his day, who also founded the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History in 1915.
Rob Read, Web communications and publications assistant in York’s Office of the Associate Vice-President International, contributed the above material to YFile.
More information about Harriet Tubman
Left: Harriet Tubman
York’s Harriet Tubman Resource Centre on the African Diaspora is named in honour of Harriet Tubman (1821-1913), feminist and political activist associated with the Underground Railroad that moved thousands of Black refugees from the United State to Canada before the American Civil War. Harriet Tubman escaped from Dorchester County, Maryland, in 1849, and personally assisted at least 200 people in their flight from slavery.
The York facility, which is part of the Department of History, is a digitalized research facility that focuses on the history of the African diaspora and the movement of Africans to various parts of the world, particularly the Americas and the Islamic lands of North Africa and the Middle East. The Harriet Tubman Resource Centre includes a digital library and repository as well as facilities for the digitalization of materials.